US fears Pakistan deployment could harm War on Terror

The Times
May 29, 2002
From Giles Whittell in Washington

AS PAKISTAN pulls tens of thousands of troops away from its northwestern frontier for use in Kashmir, American fears are growing that the redeployment could fatally undermine the War on Terror precisely where a bold strike against the al-Qaeda leadership is needed most.

Up to 1,000 al-Qaeda and Taleban fighters, possibly including Osama bin Laden, are at large in Pakistan's tribal areas and are plotting a "spectacular" disruption of next month's planned Loya Jirga, at which a future Afghan government is to be chosen, according to General Frank Hagenbeck, America's top officer in Afghanistan.

The warning came as Pakistan masses up to 80,000 extra troops along the Kashmiri Line of Control, some of them recalled from distant peacekeeping roles such as the UN operation in Sierra Leone but most of them withdrawn from the North West Frontier Province, where they have been stationed since the US bombing of the Tora Bora cave complex last year.

The redeployment was announced in advance by President Musharraf and drew an anxious response from Donald Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary. "We could be getting a lot more help from the Pakistanis if there were not the tense situation in Kashmir," he said.

Senior American officials have since repeated such concerns and one message that Richard Armitage, the Deputy Secretary of State, will take to the region next week, as one expert put it, is: "Don't spoil our war with your war."

Pakistan wants American mediation in Kashmir and analysts believe that Mr Armitage may negotiate a breathing space to give General Musharraf time to show that he is serious about curbing terrorists who have fled into the tribal areas.

A spokesman for the Pakistani Embassy in Washington said yesterday: "It's pretty clear to the Americans what's going on. No country can fight a two-front war. If anything happens in the East, we'll need all our army people on that side."

As disruptive to the War on Terror as the shifting of troops will be the diversion of Pakistani Intelligence efforts and the attention of General Musharraf's top military and civilian advisers.

Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency would play the key role in any concerted effort to root out al-Qaeda members in the tribal areas, Husain Haqqani, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and an adviser to three Pakistani Prime Ministers, said yesterday. "That would be a very labour-intensive role and the ISI will now regard the Kashmiri crisis as the chief threat to Pakistan's security."

The result could be an even more dangerous power vacuum than exists already in the tribal areas, even as Afghanistan's interim Government makes plans for the Loya Jirga.

General Hagenbeck said of the al-Qaeda fighters hiding in Pakistan: "They are looking for something that will gain them a lot of publicity, something violent that would be so spectacular that it would convince the local populace who are now sitting on the fence or supporting us that they need to re-embrace the Taleban."

The general told The New York Times that US Intelligence believes that fighters who fled the American aerial bombardment have begun to return to Afghanistan in small groups. He claimed that recent raids by US special forces, including one that was heavily criticised for causing the death of a three-year-old child who fell down a well, were aimed at breaking up such groups before they could launch a new terrorist offensive.

Few doubt that General Musharraf has the manpower to police the tribal areas even as he builds up his military presence in Kashmir. The question is whether he has the will.

Original link

 
_____
Nieuwe Oorlog 2002 | Ander Nieuws week 23